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Seeking information on viable international career paths.
WeedLordVegeta
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
The backstory leading to my current conundrum is long and sordid, so let's skip it for now. As it stands, I'm 24 looking for a real career path, ideally one with 2 years of education, maximum.
The sticky wicket is that I'd like to find a career I could easily take overseas with a minimum of re certification. I'm doing my own research thusfar, but you guys over here have a wealth of experience so I thought I'd see if you had any leads.
Thanks in advance for any and all views/replies.
The sticky wicket is that I'd like to find a career I could easily take overseas with a minimum of re certification. I'm doing my own research thusfar, but you guys over here have a wealth of experience so I thought I'd see if you had any leads.
Thanks in advance for any and all views/replies.
WeedLordVegeta on
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Often, international volunteering is relatively cheap, as the human resources are what's most valuable to the organization. Granted, it's not living in the lap of luxury, but it gets you out and doing things.
If you're looking for actually working internationally without any international experience, the "I want a job overseas" thing usually boils down to:
Europe, Australia: Waitstaff, cleaning staff, semi-temporary work
South and southeast Asia: Teaching English
Your statement that it requires no more than 2 years of education implies to me that you're not interested in more school. You are instead looking for a career path that leads you to a position overseas as a permanent relocation, correct?
And I'd LIKE to have the option for permanent relocation.
Here's the rub, you want three things:
-A career that is valuable enough to pay well (inferred)
-A career path that only requires an AA and will have to start from scratch (capped at 2 years)
-A career path that will be able to be considered valued by folks in your country and others
You simply can't have all three of those in any real field. Most fields that would give you an edge here and abroad will require, at minimum, a 4 year degree with how supersaturated the BA market is. An AA will not give you an edge for anything but an entry level position, and a fairly limited (and probably dead end) ones at that. In almost every field unless you already a) have feelers and contacts in that field or b) have some sort of relevant work experience that will get you in the door, you will likely not get anywhere without a BA or MA backing you up these days. As you are looking to start from scratch that's probably not possible.
What I would suggest is to find something you are interested in, rather than something that will make you money. If you find the former and work hard at it, the latter will come. For international transit, you can't go wrong with technology fields, especially harder sciences, as they are needed pretty much everywhere. Of course, knowing other languages is also a solid path if you want to hop across an ocean or two, as solid translators are also sought after.
But none of these will get you anywhere without some solid education behind your back. A good first step would be coming up with a plan to get you moving forward with that. 24 is young. Very young. A 4 year degree puts you at 28 and, in this economy, still ahead of the majority of the applicant pool.
If your looking for a solid career path, I think this might be right up your alley.
TylerJ on League of Legends (it's free and fun!)
1. Get a job with an international company and hope that one day you could be transferred to another country. The most popular option that I've seen are people working for banks. I don't know how likely any of this is or how high up you have to be in the company before you get a chance at this, but you can do the research. It's a long-term plan and it might never pan out so better to get a job that you like and if any international ambitions work out, great. You can also check out http://www.eurojobs.com to see what sort of jobs are advertised. Those certainly aren't the only jobs if you want to work abroad but you might get some ideas of industries to look into.
2. Teach English as a foreign language. I don't know much about this personally but from everything I've read online, it's not a pleasant experience. Low pay, no respect, no job security. Probably the easiest option, though. You don't need to be a qualified teacher, but if you do some six week course (I don't remember the name of it) you'll have an easier time finding work. You can also interview for such jobs in the US with some of the bigger companies. A lot of these jobs are in Asia or the Middle East. To some extent, I guess they're in Eastern Europe and South America. Not many people make a career out of it, though. It's something that young people will do for beer money for a year or two. But it can lead to other things. You can perhaps get a different job once you're in the country (but of course it has to be with a company who can get you a visa).
3. If you have parents or grandparents who were citizens of another country, you can look into the citizenship laws. Usually it requires at least one parent or two grandparents but Ireland only requires one Irish grandparent in order to get citizenship. And other countries might not give citizenship but if you have a grandparent they might give you a visa to work in the country. You have to look into it.
4. You can marry somebody. This is something else that can come from doing this TEFL crap. It solves the problems with visas and you can get any kind of job in the country. Most of the Americans that I see in Europe, particularly the women, are a result of marriage. Going to Asia as a guy, I think you should be able to get something going with the local women if you put your mind to it. If it's not an English-speaking country, language is going to really limit your employment options, though.
5. Go to university. From my knowledge and experience, you have to just hand over a lump sum of money for this. It might be possible to get loans but not that I've ever seen. People with a lot of money can do it. But it's a gamble. Your goal has to be to marry a local gal. Or at least somebody who isn't an American. As soon as your course is over, they thank you for the money and kick you out of the country. So you really have to aggressively pursue the ladies.
6. You can just go on vacation in some country and look around for jobs and/or women. You can stay in most countries for three months at a time. Maybe more, I don't really know.
7. You can use the internet to try to pick up the ladies. This is something I've heard of more than once with American women getting something going with non-American men. Surely it can work in reverse too, though.
8. Not something I've seen, but thinking outside the box here, you could join the military and hope that you get sent abroad (but not in a warzone). Then again, same modus operandi, you need to go womanising.
9. I think there are some countries, Holland might be an example, where you can go looking for dudes. Civil partnerships, you know. If you're so inclined, great. Otherwise, it's just a question of how desperate you are.
10. Finally, (the last few examples were just to pad the list out so I could get to ten but this last one is solid) there are jobs that are just in great demand so it's easier to get visas. I've seen a lot of foreign nurses, for example. They're getting jobs and visas. I don't know. Nurse is an obvious one but there's loads of stuff you never would even think of. Just a random example, you can see what the skilled visa list for Australia is here:
http://www.workpermit.com/australia/skilled/occupation_list.htm
A lot of medical stuff, not all of which require much schooling. Accountant, I've certainly seen some accountants get visas. I don't think that requires a bachelor's degree. IT stuff, I don't know how relevant that is anymore. There are IT people all over these days. Aircraft stuff, that would be a good one to get into. Education, that's certainly another one I've seen. Math and science in particular. Need a degree, of course, though. Trades as well, yeah. Loads of construction people have got visas that I've seen. I don't know so much anymore. Something skilled could work, though. Electrician or...people have mentioned welding and that's on the list so I guess welding as well. You probably have to have some years experience in the US before you can think of getting a visa, though.
So there are options. TEFL and marriage are the quickest and easiest.